


Nuts and Bolts

by felilivargas (orphan_account)



Category: Star Trek: The Next Generation
Genre: Depression, Gen, Self-Harm, ventfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-03-10
Updated: 2016-03-10
Packaged: 2018-05-25 21:46:18
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,474
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6211303
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/orphan_account/pseuds/felilivargas
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Lore is tired of feeling nothing and self harms. Data finds out. Warning for graphic descriptions of self harm and implied emotional abuse.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Nuts and Bolts

It was as if he was in a trance. He knew the implications of what he was doing- he'd lurked on enough emo band fan-forums to know that- but he couldn't stop himself. His fingers traced a seam in his skin, searching for the button that would cause it to pop open, revealing his inner hardware... yes... there it was. He pressed it, and there shone his innards, in all their second-rate, cheap glory.

  
You know, it was kind of silly; humans always hurt themselves to remind themselves that they were alive, but Lore had never felt an ounce of physical pain in his entire life. He wondered... If he dug deep enough, could he?

  
He was tentative, at first. He didn't know how much damage he was willing to do to himself... He placed two fingers around a single screw, and, carefully, began to unscrew it. It could have only been a few seconds, butthey felt like ages. Somewhere in Lore's mind, some conscience was warning him this was a bad idea. Good, he decided. In human terms, that meant he was alive, right?

  
He pulled the screw out, slowly, and stared at it, turning it between his index finger and his thumb. He tried to imagine himself explaining to Data that hurting yourself made you more human. But... He felt no pain. Truly an android he was after all.

  
He placed the screw down gently on the ground beside him, and begun unscrewing the next screw. He turned it between his fingers, this time shutting his eyes. He settled down into a more comfortable seating position, eyes still closed, trying his hardest to feel something inside his arm. Looseness, pain, anything... But no, it was all numb. Numb, numb, numb, everything about him was numb, it seemed, except for his mind. His mind... Now that was a fire. That burned.

  
He dropped the screw beside him, unscrewing the next screw. He couldn't run from it anymore; he wondered what he'd done wrong that had convinced Dr. Soong that he was a lost cause. There was the crystalline entity, but no, oh no, Dr. Soong's discontent for him had begun much sooner than that. He could barely remember a time when Dr. Soong had loved him; did the time even exist at all? The screw popped out; he dropped it on the ground, next to the other screws. He grabbed another screw and started twisting.  
No, no... This time could never have existed. His father had nurtured him as a younger child, but something was off, something had been so off from the very start. The longer Lore was alive, the more Dr. Soong got to know him, and the more distant he became. The screw popped out, and he dropped it aimlessly to the ground, searching for the next screw more with his fingers than his eyes. He almost yanked against it; he heard the soft click of metal pieces colliding, but felt nothing. What did Lore do? What did Lore do? Somehow, he didn't believe that his father had simply no idea that he'd been repaired; had Data never contacted him? Why hadn't he returned to Omicron Theta to get the pieces of him to repair anyways? He had no right to abandon him like that! God damn, at least admit that Lore was a failure to his fucking face! The suspense hurt Lore almost more than the knowledge that everything he was- his emotions, his consciousness, his dumb fucking everything- was a failure in Dr. Soong's eyes. Why didn't he try to fix him if he was so much of a disaster? Did he really hate Lore that much so as to just abandon him? What had Lore done? What had Lore not done? Was he worthy of Dr. Soong's care? Was he worthy of ANYONE's care?-

  
The screw popped out into Lore's hand, and he dropped it on the floor. He leaned his head back against the wall, resting his arm. A hot liquid trailed down his cheek, and he realized he was crying bitter, angry tears. But rather than hold it back, he let them come.

  
Lore was shaking as he sobbed. His voice was silent, but he wanted to scream. He wanted to scream and tear himself apart more, and more, and more, until he was nothing left but scrap metal and hatred, but he couldn't bring himself to move. His thoughts were racing almost too fast for even him to process. He was nothing, he was everything; Why had Dr. Soong left him? Why hadn't Dr. Soong left him sooner? Why wasn't he good enough? Why did no one else see that he was so much more than good enough, he was brilliant? Of course he wasn't brilliant, or he'd've found a way to make people stop hating him; but Data would tell him his emotions make him evil anyways, that perfect little Data who Dr. Soong loved so much; Did anyone care about Lore? He cared about Data, he cared about Dr. Soong, but Dr. Soong hated him, and, as far as Data was concerned, Lore was the spawn of evil, by whatever silly little emotionless definition Dr. Soong had given him. Granted, Lore had just tried to destroy the Enterprise, but he didn't see why Data was so drawn to this damn ship anyways. All of his thoughts flying at the speed of light only fed his emotions more, and more, until the candle inside him was an explosion of emotional agony, in some weird limbo between being cripplingly egotistical and hating every single fiber of his being. All of this pain and he could never feel a fucking thing of it.

  
Well, he could try.

  
Those screws had nearly unscrewed a small panel inside Lore's forearm, and he tore it off, the last screw giving as it was yanked out of place. He threw the missing panel beside him; he didn't care how much damage he did anymore. He was determined to feel something. Anything. Underneath the panel lay a long metal rod, and a small cluster of wires. He grasped the wires with his free hand, begging that one of them somehow transmit pain into the mess he dared call a positronic "brain." When his fingers were latched around it, they pulled, resulting in a large resounding SNAP from the interior of his arm-

  
The doors whooshed open, and Lore's eyes jerked upwards to meet those of a very confused Data.

  
Shit.

  
These were Data's fucking quarters.

  
Data furrowed his eyebrows, cocking his head at Lore. "Lore?"

  
Lore nodded. He couldn't bring himself to speak, and even if he could, he didn't really know what to say.

  
Data inquired to him further. "Lore, I was unaware that you were in my quarters. Were you looking for me?"

  
Lore shook his head. He tried to bring himself to speak, but his mouth felt like an alien part of him. Nothing felt real; nothing except Data. "N-No-"

  
The younger android's eyes fell to Lore's arm. Though Data had no emotion, it felt appropriate to describe him as... startled. "Brother," he said, "your arm is damaged."

  
Lore nodded. His voice was weak. "I know."

  
Rather than picking up on Lore's situation, Data strode forward. "If you will allow me, I believe I can help you repair the damage."

  
"N-No, brother," Lore tried to start, "it's fine-"

  
But when Data kneeled, and examined Lore's wound, he stopped and stared at it with a puzzled expression. Lore wondered what was so strange about it, other than the fact that it had supposedly appeared out of nowhere, when it dawned on him:

  
He was still clutching the snapped wires inside his arm.

  
Data knelt down to meet his brother's eyes. When the two pairs of golden irises had met evenly, Data spoke softly, delicately. "Brother... were you..." Did Lore not know him better, he would assume Data was searching for words. "engaging in a self-destructive activity?"

  
Lore couldn't take his gaze off of Data's anymore, but he felt a tear drip down his cheek as he nodded.

 

Lore had rested his arm on the table; partially because the stability made it easier to repair, partially because he had completely lost control of his hand and this way it wouldn't flop around. Data had retreated to the corner of the room where Lore had been sitting to scavenge for discarded screws and pieces of arm. He had closed the door to give Lore privacy while he recovered.

  
"What I don't understand, brother," Data called, "is how physical harm was intended to invoke an emotional response."

  
"Oh, emotions do funny things to you, brother," Lore scoffed. His tone was enthusiastic and mocking as normal, but his voice was still shaky. "They control you. Demand to be heard."

  
"Heard?"

  
"Well... felt."

**Author's Note:**

> For mental health reasons, I will probably never complete this work and am publishing it as is. Please understand.  
> This work is based a lot off of my own experience with emotional abuse and self harm, so please understand that I'm not trying to make Lore have an Edgy Past at all, or excusing him, or whatnot.


End file.
